How to Create SFTP User without Shell Access on CentOS/RHEL 7

This tutorial will help you to create SFTP only user (without ssh access) on CentOS and RedHat systems. The user can connect the server with SFTP access only and allowed to access the specified directory. Users can’t SSH into the server. Follow the below tutorial to create sftp only account.

Step 1 – Create Account

First of all, create a user account to use for sftp access. Below command will create user named sftpuser with no shell access.

sudo adduser --shell /bin/false sftpuser
sudo passwd sftpuser

Step 2 – Create Directory

Now, create the directory structure to be accessible by sftp user.

sudo mkdir -p /var/sftp/files

Change the ownership of the files directory to sftp user. So that the sftpuser can read and write on this directory.

sudo chown sftpuser:sftpuser /var/sftp/files

And set the owner and group owner of the /var/sftp to root. The root user has read/write access on this access. Group members and other accounts have only read and execute permissions.

sudo chown root:root /var/sftp
sudo chmod 755 /var/sftp

Step 3 – Configure SSH for SFTP

Now edit the SSH configuration file in a text editor

sudo vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config

and add the following settings at end of file.

Match User sftpuser
	ForceCommand internal-sftp
	PasswordAuthentication yes
	ChrootDirectory /var/sftp
	PermitTunnel no
	AllowAgentForwarding no
	AllowTcpForwarding no
	X11Forwarding no

Save the configuration and restart SSH service to apply changes.

sudo systemctl restart sshd.service

Step 4 – Test SFTP Connection

I am using FileZilla for the connection to the SFTP instance from my Windows systems. Linux desktop users can also use Filezilla for connection.

For the Linux server, users can use sftp command-line utility to connect to remote sftp instance.

sftp sftpuser@sftp.tecadmin.net

Connecting to sftp.tecadmin.net...
sftpuser@sftp.tecadmin.net's password:
sftp>

Connect with FileZilla:

As this account is configured for SFTP only connection. So if any user tried to connect via SSH will be disconnected immediately after successful authentication. User will get below message:

ssh sftpuser@sftp.tecadmin.net

sftpuser@sftp.tecadmin.net's password:
This service allows sftp connections only.
Connection to sftp.tecadmin.net closed.